Redstone Government Consulting Blog | Redstone Team (3)

Many new government contractors are frustrated by being told they have a CAS 401 noncompliance, especially if they are not CAS covered. This is, of course, wrong terminology for non-CAS covered contractors, but is shorthand for saying the company is not estimating, accumulating, and reporting costs the same way. This is most frequently a difference between how a company estimates cost and then how the company accumulates and reports costs. This is not only important to the government, but to the company itself. A contractor cannot determine whether it is losing money on a contract if there is no way to compare what was bid to what was incurred. This is likely one of the first CAS standards a company encounters because even modified coverage calls this standard into play.

Oftentimes when supporting the production of cost volumes and pricing exercises for clients, we’re given a basis of estimate (BOE) that has been written by someone on the technical team. Even being a group of accounting and compliance professionals who know little in areas such as cyber, engineering, or other technical areas of the scope of work, we’re left scratching our heads. This usually leads to several back-and-forth discussions centered around gleaning enough information from the technical team to pass the proverbial government “sniff test”.

What is the Incurred Cost Submission? What is Schedule O? What are the Supplemental A Schedules? This VLOG will briefly explain the Incurred Cost Submission, how to complete Schedules O and the Supplemental A Schedules, and the importance of those schedules.

Schedules H and J are some of the most important parts of the Incurred Cost Submission. This VLOG will briefly explain the Incurred Cost Submission, how to complete Schedules H and J, and the importance of each schedule.

Schedules B, C, D, and Fringe are some of the most important parts of the Incurred Cost Submission. This vLOG will briefly explain the Incurred Cost Submission, how to complete Schedules B, C, D, and Fringe, and the importance of each schedule.

Thank you to all of our sponsors and attendees for their support of the 2022 Redstone Edge Conference. All profits from the conference are being donated to Castin’ ‘N Catchin’.

Importance of Basis of Estimate

The proposal is often the procurement parties’ first introduction to a company. It is important to remember that different readers are looking for different types of content from the proposal. From an auditor’s viewpoint, an important part of a contractor’s cost estimating process is preparing the basis of estimate (BOE).

Schedule K is one of the most important parts of the Incurred Cost Submission and is an area of great interest for the Government and its auditors. This VLOG will briefly explain the Incurred Cost Submission, how to complete Schedule K, and the importance of Schedule K.

Intuit is constantly developing and improving QuickBooks, particularly the online version. And while it’s still not nearly as robust as some of the more complex accounting software solutions that are geared specifically toward government contractors (nor should we expect it to be with the price point difference), it will still get the job done, particularly for small to mid-size contractors that don’t have a bunch of overly complex contracts.

Schedule I is the most important part of the Incurred Cost Submission and is the single area of great interest for the Government and its auditors. This VLOG will briefly explain the Incurred Cost Submission, the importance of Schedule I, and how to resolve potential issues.